Reader Barbara observes…

...that one of the principal differences between the Left and the Right is that the Right tends to recognize the reality of sexual sin (real or imagined) while more or less ignoring the possibility of gustatory sin, while the Left tends to obsess over gustatory sins (real or imagined) and ignore sexual sin. So, for the Left, you can have intimate congress with a cow, but don’t you dare eat it while, for the Right, gluttony and selfishness tend to be a pecadillo (certainly not one of the Seven Deadly Sins) and attempts to help the poor tend to be viewed as incipient communist revolution.

So just the other day, a reader was informing me that he didn’t believe in the corporal work of mercy of “feeding the hungry.” Let the parasites get a job! Why should decent citizens support useless eaters?

And here is Michael Bloomberg, Mayor of the City of Polymorphous Perversity demonstrating the Lefty side of reader Barbara’s point: We must regulate soup!

Comments

What many people may not realize is that some of those who appear to us fit and youthful enough to work, may in fact be mentally or emotionally gravely ill . . . so ill that . . . well, having been through some emotionally stormy times myself when I was younger, I realize what a *blessing* it is to be in a place in which one is capable of applying oneself to productive work - any work, instead of living perpetually in a hopeless maelstrom of overwhelming fear, anxiety, and emotional turmoil, as our mentally ill population do. Imagine the movie _The Perfect Storm_ the scenes in which the little fishing boat encounters two Category five hurricanes at once, and then saying to the skipper, “just hold her on course.”

Um, I don’t think he can. However hard he tries. Untreated, or not-well-treated mental and emotional illness can be a lot like what that little fishing boat experienced.

I thank God every day that I *can* work. That I *can* cope with daily life. That I *can* get along somehow with other people. That I *can* concentrate on my work. That I *can* get up each morning, put myself together and out the door. That I *can* find a way to communicate with my supervisor, even when there is some difficulty or misunderstanding. That I *can* maintain a positive attitude. That I *can* recharge in a lovely, peaceful home, get a good night’s sleep, and be back up and at ‘em the next day.

These things are gifts . . . GIFTS! from the good God, that not everyone has received, or that some have yet to receive. Many of our homeless and other unfortunate persons are in this category. Yes, ultimately, the goal is for them to receive the gift of being ready, willing, and able to work productively, but in the meantime, such persons need our compassion, generosity, support, and encouragement to move forward slowly but surely, with our help, at a pace they can handle. They need to know that we are there for them, and that we won’t give up on them, and that the ultimate goal remains productivity, dignity, accomplishment, and self-respect, but always communicated to them with gentleness and compassion.

Posted by Elisa on Wednesday, Nov 17, 2010 12:13 AM (EDT):

One thing I noticed about the reading this past Sunday that I have never noticed before is that Paul specifically says “one who WILL not work”, not simply “one who does not work”. There are people who cannot work either through age, disability, or lack of employment. I doubt St. Paul was talking about them.

Posted by Billy Bean on Tuesday, Nov 16, 2010 9:55 PM (EDT):

Mark: Thank you for reminding me that, despite all my proclivities toward the “Right,” there is none RIGHTeous, save ONE.

Posted by Mark P. Shea on Tuesday, Nov 16, 2010 4:04 PM (EDT):

The epistle reading at this past Sunday mass contained VERY explicit instructions from St. Paul that one must work for one’s keep.

Bearing in mind, of course, that Paul is writing instructions to the Church and is particularly concerned with discouraging lazy busybodies from suctioning off the church’s funds for almsgiving. In other words, precisely what Paul is concerned to do is make sure the Church can give freely to the poor in obedience to Jesus’ command to “give to him who asks”. He’s not prescribing state policy or setting out a social program for a relief agency. Nor is he opposing such a program. Not on the agenda for Paul.

Posted by Tom on Tuesday, Nov 16, 2010 3:36 PM (EDT):

THERESE60640,

I’ve been thinking a lot about that reading from Paul’s letters this week, too. Here’s my question: What about the involuntarily unemployed, people who want to work, but can’t find jobs? What is the right role of government in their case? What is the right role of private charity? I’ve been puzzling over it in light of that reading, but remain perplexed. What do you think?

Posted by Tom on Tuesday, Nov 16, 2010 3:23 PM (EDT):

David B.,
.
You’re right that in their capacity as political leaders, politicians DO need to worry about others’ behavior as well as their own personal virtue. Indeed, I think that the things worried about by BOTH the Right and the Left are valid. However, partisans seem to prefer to criticize those vices that tempt them least, and have a blind spot when it comes to criticizing those vices that tempt them more. Thus, happily married rich Republicans smugly criticize others’ lusts, while cash-strapped promiscuous liberal grad students smugly criticize others’ greed: they might do more good if they swapped preoccupations.
* * *
As for why Mark categorizes the Right with generalities, I imagine it’s for the same reason he categorizes the Left with generalities: Assuming that tens of millions of Americans belong to each category, it would be rather unwieldy to try to talk about the specific beliefs of each one of those Americans in this blog!
.
The fabulist Jorge Luis Borges told a story about an emperor obsessed with accuracy: He ordered that a map of his empire be made at a 1:1 scale of magnification, so it could show every detail. The problem was, the map just sat on top of the whole empire like a paper roof, and you had to walk to your destination just to find it on the map. It was useless, and people allowed it to rot away. The story ends with lost scraps of the emperor’s map blowing around like tumbleweed.
.
Reality is too complex to think about without abstractions. That’s why we talk about the number two, rather than having a separate discussion every time we want to talk about two apples, two oranges, or two whatevers.
.
Mark is using simplified models because that’s how humans think. Every model is open to the complaint that it simplifies reality. However, unless we understand that the modeler is just trying to avoid duplicating the problems with emperor’s 1:1 map, that complaint can become just a rhetorical device, rather than a novel or constructive critique.

Posted by THERESE60640 on Tuesday, Nov 16, 2010 2:43 PM (EDT):

Tim,

The epistle reading at this past Sunday mass contained VERY explicit instructions from St. Paul that one must work for one’s keep.

Posted by THERESE60640 on Tuesday, Nov 16, 2010 2:41 PM (EDT):

Dear Cowaboinka,
What great satire! Am I correctly assuming you are joking to make a great point about the idiocy of extremist environmentalism?

Posted by Tim on Tuesday, Nov 16, 2010 2:40 AM (EDT):

I would probably take the view that most on the “Right” have no problem helping people that truly need it, feeding, clothing, etc. It is the ones that purposely intend to live off the labors of others that cause the problem. If I remember correctly, somewhere in the Cathechism it states that people have a duty to work. The poor, however it happened, are always with us and we have a high obligation and duty to them. So we need a moral capitalism. Industry not for industry’s sake or for pure monetary gain, but for the good of all.

Posted by David B. on Tuesday, Nov 16, 2010 12:27 AM (EDT):

Tom,

I am all for self-examination. However, national leaders bear more burden than the rest of us, so they should be worried about exploitation of welfare programs, (yeah, it happens) bellicose nations, preserving resources, etc. Just as the government is tasked with defending the nation for its enemies, so too it is concerned with the common good. But within limits.

I just do not understand why Mark feels to need to categorize the ‘Right’ with generalities.

Posted by cowaboinka on Monday, Nov 15, 2010 7:47 PM (EDT):

You speciesist bigots! How dare you impose your anthronormative views on us poor, suffering zoosexuals. Zoosexuality is a natural, healthy form of erotic expression and we are tired of being oppressed by people who believe that marriage can only be between two people of the same generis. Interspecies relationships exist and have existed since the beginning of time. What do you think Adam did before Eve was created? All those animals around? Come On! Bessie and I have been engaged in a loving, consensual monogamous relationship for years now, but any two people can get drunk in Vegas and become husband and wife? It’s time for people like us to come out of the barn. Down with Zoophobia!

Posted by Barbara on Monday, Nov 15, 2010 6:52 PM (EDT):

I came to this conclusion standing at a bus stop in my hometown of Victoria BC with my baby. I always wait at the same stop in the shelter of a cafe that purports to sell “Living food” which my postpartum brain initially registered as “still moving” but in Wet Coast hippiespeak apparently means raw, free trade and morally pure. So apparently no animals or Latin American farmers suffered for its production therefore good-hearted hippie folk (with enough money to spend 7 dollars on a cup of hot chocolate with almond milk and cinnamon) can eat it and become lifted up on clouds of self-satisfaction.

Meanwhile I’m gonna take my baby home to my Latin American farmer husband and enjoy some dead food on toast preferably with mustard and a cup of regular oppressive coffee. As a comedian I heard expounding on the topic of free-range chicken recently remarked “I’m just too broke to be good, I have to eat lazy chicken instead”.

The political Right worries about:
Libertine lusts, envy of the wealthy, and the sloth of people on welfare.

The political Left worries about:
Corporate greed, war-mongering wrath, and gluttonous overconsumption of both fat and carbon.

Both exhibit Pride by paying more attention to the other tribe’s splinters than their own “eye-beams”.

As for me, I’m well enough acquainted with all seven deadly sins in myself to feel far more at home in a confessional than in either tribe of our partisan duopoly.

Posted by Tony61 on Monday, Nov 15, 2010 2:13 PM (EDT):

I would maintain that it is not an issue of Left vs Right, but rather an issue of Populists vs Corporatists; The Corporatists (both Dem and Republican) have diverted our attention away their massive corporate farm subsidies by “harping about personal pecadilloes”. The Populists really have no voice in government, so guys like Bloomberg feel very free to impinge on personal rights to eat whatever we want.

What we really need to do is stop paying corporate farms with tax subsidies to give us meat and poultry that are not good for us. I realize your blog post is a light-hearted jab at the seeming dissonance in our policies, but if we start to see all regulation (or lack thereof) as a function of how it helps/hurts our corporate task masters, the image becomes clear.

Posted by David B. on Monday, Nov 15, 2010 12:11 PM (EDT):

“for the Right, gluttony and selfishness tend to be a pecadillo… and attempts to help the poor tend to be viewed as incipient communist revolution.”

Conservative Christians are the most giving people of any groups, so I don’t see how you can make that point against average ‘right-wingers’.

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About Mark Shea

Mark P. Shea is a popular Catholic writer and speaker. The author of numerous books, his most recent work is The Work of Mercy (Servant) and The Heart of Catholic Prayer (Our Sunday Visitor). Mark contributes numerous articles to many magazines, including his popular column “Connecting the Dots” for the National Catholic Register. Mark is known nationally for his one minute “Words of Encouragement” on Catholic radio. He also maintains the Catholic and Enjoying It blog. He lives in Washington state with his wife, Janet, and their four sons.